Newsletter

Posted July 26, 2013 01:02 am - Updated July 26, 2013 01:06 am

Augusta Chronicle Editorial Staff

Who will stand for women?

Rape in Dubai, and its aftermath, is an assault on freedom

Like a weekend hacker who can’t shoot straight, the Western media last week were all over Muirfield golf course as it hosted the British Open – and we mean all over it – for not admitting female members.

“Never mind that this is an issue that has no impact on any of our lives,” writes Jay Hart, senior editor of Yahoo Sports. “When there’s low-hanging fruit to be picked, well, (the media will) pick it.”

Absolutely.

So let’s talk about some of the higher-up fruit the media are either missing or soft-peddling.

While the big story in the West was that men are somehow injuring women by having their own golf club, a woman in Dubai was freed from jail – “pardoned,” they claim – after being sentenced to 16 months for being raped.

The Norwegian woman on a business visit had reported to police that a colleague from Sudan had raped her. Authorities jailed both of them, sentencing her to 16 months for extramarital sex and drinking. The alleged rapist got only 13 months, though you’ll be glad to know that he earned a pardon, too. Apparently it’s hard to get convicted of rape there unless you confess or have an adult male witness testify against you.

They certainly can’t listen to a woman!

What an outrage, and an assault on human freedom.

Of course, if you take your cues from the media, you’d think that the real outrage was a golf club in Scotland.

There are no words to adequately express our disgust and revulsion at a system – political or religious – that so reviles women that it imprisons them for having been sexually assaulted. That not only re-victimizes a victim, but it also discourages other victims from ever coming forward – de facto, legitimizing rape.

Thank goodness the woman in this case, 24-year-old Marte Deborah Dalelv, had the courage to tell her story publicly, so as to bring international and diplomatic pressure to bear on authorities in Dubai to release her.

It shouldn’t take the intervention of foreign governments, or a few focused media outlets – or a brave young woman willing to make her assault publicly known – to prevent such gross miscarriages of justice. Women should not have to put themselves in harm’s way by simply entering a country and attempting to do business there.

Don’t look now, but there is a growing push in various places in America to recognize the very sharia law that treats women in such ways.

Now is the time to stand up against such evil.

The world famously, and rightly, banded together to end racial apartheid. When will we stand up for women thusly?